John Sessions Quotes

dating you would be like a series of unnecessary root canals interspersed with occasional makeout sessions.

Life is now in session. Are you present?

Needing someone doesn't make you weak, it makes you feel. And feeling is how you know you're alive. -Jack Reacher

There it was, burned into the text box, their code: “Sword of the Spirit.” They’d both attended weekly Bible study at the home of a lay person, and after the session one evening they talked about the expression that ultimately would become their code. They interpreted it to mean ‘the Word of God.

Look, you’re right. Maybe I don’t like you the way someone should like you. I don’t like you in the call-you-and-read-you-a-poem-every-night-before-you-go-to-bed way. I’m crazy, okay? Sometimes I think, like, God, she’s superhot and smart and kind of pretentious but the pretentiousness just makes me kind of want her, and then other times I think it’s an amazingly bad idea, that dating you would be like a series of unnecessary root canals interspersed with occasional makeout sessions.

if you have an important afternoon brainstorming session scheduled, going for a short, intense run during lunchtime is a smart idea.

TT: This session was never meant to bear fruit. TT: It's barren, so to speak. EB: that's a bit of a bummer! EB: i am still skeptical about that, though. TT: That's why you're our leader, John. EB: huh? TT: Optimism through stalwart skepticism is a defect not everyone is lucky enough to be cursed with. EB: that's stupid. EB: i'm not your leader, i am your FRIEND, there is a BIG difference! TT: Statements like that are also why you're our leader.

Paul: 'After recording sessions, at two or three in the morning, we'd be careering through the villages on the way to Weybridge, shouting 'weyhey' and driving much too fast. George would perhaps be in his Ferrari - he was quite a fast driver - and John and I would be following in his big Rolls Royce or the Princess. John had a mike in the Rolls with a loudspeaker outside and he'd be shouting to George in the front: 'It is foolish to resist, it is foolish to resist! Pull over!' It was insane. All the lights would go on in the houses as we went past - it must have freaked everybody out. When John went to make 'How I Won the War' in Spain, he took the same car, which he virtually lived in. It had blacked-out windows and you could never see who was in it, so it was perfect. John didn't come out of it - he just used to talk to the people outside through the microphone: 'Get away from the car! Get away!

Cognitive flexibility is an important executive function that reflects our ability to shift thinking and to produce a steady flow of creative thoughts and answers as opposed to a regurgitation of the usual responses. The trait correlates with high-performance levels in intellectually demanding jobs. So if you have an important afternoon brainstorming session scheduled, going for a short, intense run during lunchtime is a smart idea.

Will hadn’t seen him come into the room. He realized that the mysterious figure must have slipped in through a side door while everyone’s attention was on the Craftmasters as they made their entrance. Now he stood behind the Baron’s chair and slightly to one side, dressed in his usual brown and gray clothes and wrapped in his long, mottled gray and green Ranger’s cloak. Halt was an unnerving person. He had a habit of coming up on you when you least expected it—and you never heard his approach. The superstitious villagers believed that Rangers practiced a form of magic that made them invisible to ordinary people. Will wasn’t sure if he believed that—but he wasn’t sure he disbelieved it either. He wondered why Halt was here today. He wasn’t recognized as one of the Craftmasters and, as far as Will knew, he hadn’t attended a Choosing session prior to this one.

Three sessions later she dismissed her therapist as ‘a dick’ and never returned.

John Grisham exhaled, feeling his breath leave his body as he did, like his wife’s yoga instructor had taught him to do that one time. He never went back to that yoga instructor, but he still thought about that session sometimes.

Take the issue of women being interrupted. An analysis of fifteen years of Supreme Court oral arguments found that ‘men interrupt more than women, and they particularly interrupt women more than they interrupt other men’.73 This goes for male lawyers (female lawyers weren’t found to interrupt at all) as well as judges, even though lawyers are meant to stop speaking when a justice starts speaking. And, as in the political sphere, the problem seems to have got worse as female representation on the bench has increased. An individualist solution might be to tell women to interrupt right back74 – perhaps working on their ‘polite interrupting’75 skills. But there’s a problem with this apparently gender-neutral approach, which is that it isn’t gender-neutral in effect: interrupting simply isn’t viewed the same way when women do it. In June 2017 US Senator Kamala Harris was asking an evasive Attorney General Jeff Sessions some tough questions. When he prevaricated once too often, she interrupted him and pressed him to answer. She was then in turn (on two separate occasions) interrupted and admonished by Senator John McCain for her questioning style.76 He did not do the same to her colleague Senator Rob Wyden, who subjected Sessions to similarly dogged questioning, and it was only Harris who was later dubbed ‘hysterical’.

He chuckled and pulled himself to his feet. “End of session, McGee. Good night and good luck.” At the door he turned and said, “I’ll have you checked out, of course. Just for the hell of it. I’m a careful and inquisitive man.

Unfortunately, many people think they're undertraining all the time because they don't puke every workout, the world record doesn't fall during the session, or a swarm of reporters from People Magazine aren't taking their pictures.

That’s why a brainstorming session is a complete and utter waste of time for the truly creative person. The idea that, say at ten o’clock on Thursday morning, you can attend a meeting and suddenly be creative is ridiculous. Creativity doesn’t work like that.

Salvation doesn’t mean simply being rescued from the consequences of our wrong choices. It doesn’t mean being delivered into better circumstances. It means being changed. Salvation isn’t primarily a matter of going to the good place. It’s about becoming good people.

In time of war, our attention is called so exclusively to the sins of other people that we are sometimes inclined to forget our own sins. Attention to the sins of other people is, indeed, sometimes necessary. It is quite right to be indignant against any oppression of the weak which is being carried on by the strong. But such a habit of mind, if made permanent, if carried over into the days of peace, has its dangers. It joins forces with the collectivism of the modern state to obscure the individual, personal character of guilt. If John Smith beats his wife nowadays, no one is so old-fashioned as to blame John Smith for it. On the contrary, it is said, John Smith is evidently the victim of some more of that Bolshevistic propaganda; Congress ought to be called in extra session in order to take up the case of John Smith in an alien and sedition law.

every human being.”[12] Salvation doesn’t mean simply being rescued from the consequences of our wrong choices. It doesn’t mean being delivered into better circumstances. It means being changed. Salvation isn’t primarily a matter of going to the good place. It’s about becoming good people.

This soirée was followed by a longer and more serious session in Pommeroy's, which had ended once again, I regret to say, with Henry and me recalling the great hits of Dame Vera Lynn. So now I turned my face to the wall, closed my eyes and knew what it was like to stand on the edge of eternity.

An analysis of 15 years of Supreme Court oral arguments found that men interrupt more than women. And they particularly interrupt women more than they interrupt other men... An individualist solution might be to tell women to interrupt right back... But there’s a problem... interrupting simply isn’t viewed the same way when women do it. In June 2017, US senator Kamala Harris was asking an evasive attorney general Jeff Sessions some tough questions. When he prevaricated once too often, she interrupted him and pressed him to answer. She was then in turn, on two separate occasions, interrupted and admonished by senator John McCain for her questioning style. He did not do the same to her (male) colleague Senator Ron Wyden who subjected Sessions to similarly dogged questioning. And it was only Harris who was then dubbed ‘hysterical’.

Why? Because therapy culture often pushes us deeper into hiding. As individualistic westerners, we are bent toward isolation, not openness. And for many people, therapy sessions are a warped form of individualism. People want to go someplace safe where nobody in their real, actual life—people who know them, love them, and have a history with them—get to hear what’s going on deep inside. There is a profound danger to that.

The four solo careers unveiled previously hidden internal politics as each man packed and moved out from the cozy Beatle mansion. Lennon seemed closest to Ringo, and then George; neither Harrison nor Lennon ever appeared on a McCartney solo album or vice-versa, whereas Ringo played for all three. Of course, Lennon’s solo “career” had begun as early as 1968 with numbers like “What’s the New Mary Jane” and “Revolution 9” during the White Album sessions, and then his avant-garde projects with Ono. Casual jams reflected these affinities as well: John and Yoko appeared onstage with George Harrison, Eric Clapton, and the Bonnie and Delaney band in London in December of 1969. Harrison was slumming with the band after sitting in for a night and having rather too much fun; he appeared onstage anonymously until it got reported in the music press. Mostly they got away with two weeks of touring, with Clapton and Harrison sharing lead guitars almost before most audiences figured this out.

Practice Goals for Stage One There are two goals for Stage One. First, you’ll learn how to prepare for practice, and to use a simple method to enter meditation gradually. Second, and more important, is to establish a consistent daily practice where you meditate to the best of your ability throughout every session. To succeed, you’ll need to recognize the obstacles that stand in your way and create solutions. Mastering this Stage provides you with the strong foundation you need to progress rapidly through the Ten Stages.

The scope and audacity of John Kennedy’s May 25, 1961, message to a joint session of Congress on “Urgent National Needs”—the speech that launched the Apollo program—dazzled me. We would use rockets not yet designed and alloys not yet conceived, navigation and docking schemes not yet devised, in order to send a man to an unknown world—a world not yet explored, not even in a preliminary way, not even by robots—and we would bring him safely back, and we would do it before the decade was over. This confident pronouncement was made before any American had even achieved Earth orbit.

keep getting asked by letter and on the street by Jane and John Does dressed in spandex how they can prepare simple “gourmet” dinners in ten minutes so as to prolong, presumably, their cross-training and spritzer-drinking binges, massage and colonic appointments, drumming and marriage-counseling sessions, and tarot-card swap clubs. An easy answer here. Scoop ample quantities of Skippy on two paper plates. Handcuff each other and then slam your faces down into the plates with gusto. Good for the gluteus maximus. And it will bring you together at the sink, plus you won’t have to violate your space by answering the phone. Back to the

A group of pastors was attending a conference at our church, and at the end of the first morning session, they headed to the fellowship center for lunch. Several minutes later I followed, expecting that they would already be seated. Much to my surprise, all one hundred fifty of them were lined up outside the door. Then I saw why. At the head of the line stood Joel, my then six-year-old, with both hands raised, giving orders. “It will be a couple more minutes and then they’ll be ready for you!” Joel had no clue what was going on, but he gave directions with the greatest of confidence and these pastors did as they were told. Confidence is contagious even if it’s the confidence of a six-year-old. The

Let’s be honest: Any prison interview of this type begins as a mutual seduction. I am there to seduce the convict into believing that my sole purpose in being there is to help him get out. And he is there to seduce me into believing that he is worthy of getting out. It usually takes a fair amount of time to get beyond those opening positions as the pretense is gradually stripped away to reveal who we each are. My part in this case was to come across as if I was helping him think about and prepare for the big day when he would be paroled. This was not insincere on my part. I had to go into this session with a completely open mind, and with the goal to turn on the switch in his brain that would reveal his inner thoughts and fantasies.

Mr. Sturgess ran the classes with iron, ex-military discipline. We each had spots on the floor, denoting where we should stand rigidly to attention, awaiting our next task. And he pushed us hard. It felt like Mr. Sturgess had forgotten that we were only age six--but as kids, we loved it. It made us feel special. We would line up in rows beneath a metal bar, some seven feet off the ground, then one by one we would say: “Up, please, Mr. Sturgess,” and he would lift us up and leave us hanging, as he continued down the line. The rules were simple: you were not allowed to ask permission to drop off until the whole row was up and hanging, like dead pheasants in a game larder. And even then you had to request: “Down, please, Mr. Sturgess.” If you buckled and dropped off prematurely, you were sent back in shame to your spot. I found I loved these sessions and took great pride in determining to be the last man hanging. Mum would say that she couldn’t bear to watch as my little skinny body hung there, my face purple and contorted in blind determination to stick it out until the bitter end. One by one the other boys would drop off the bar, and I would be left hanging there, battling to endure until the point where even Mr. Sturgess would decide it was time to call it. I would then scuttle back to my mark, grinning from ear to ear. “Down, please, Mr. Sturgess,” became a family phrase for us, as an example of hard physical exercise, strict discipline, and foolhardy determination. All of which would serve me well in later military days. So my training was pretty well rounded. Climbing. Hanging. Escaping. I loved them all. Mum, still to this day, says that growing up I seemed destined to be a mix of Robin Hood, Harry Houdini, John the Baptist, and an assassin. I took it as a great compliment.

I’m Nancy Wilson. I’m with a band called Heart. We, uh, we’re from Seattle.” There was no recognition on these guys' faces. I might as well have told them we were the Von Trapps. But they had some pot. “Hey, little lady, want some?” one old guy asked. “Okay, if you insist, just a tiny bit,” I said. I hadn’t had pot for ages, and this was some mellow stuff, like sixties pot. It was exactly the right kind. Suddenly, I was loose and free. I went into the house, and there were a slew of guitars in the center of the room. Our road manager Bill Cracknell told me later that Tony Brown always wanted his parties to turn into jam sessions, but they rarely did. I’ve never seen a guitar I didn’t want to play. I picked one up, and started into Elton John’s “Country Comfort.” My pot-smoking friends joined in, and so did my sister. I started walking with the guitar, and gesturing to everyone to “come on.” Sheryl Crow grabbed a guitar; George Strait, too. Soon enough it was a superstar jam session with Vince Gill, Clint Black, Michelle Branch, Reba McIntire, and many more. I love hootenannies, but this was one of the best.

The philosopher John Locke once described the case of a man who had learned to dance by practicing according to a strict ritual, always in the same room, which contained an old trunk. Unfortunately, wrote Locke, “the idea of this remarkable piece of household stuff had so mixed itself with the turns and steps of all his dances, that though in that chamber he could dance excellently well, yet it was only when that trunk was there; he could not perform well in any other place unless that or some other trunk had its due position in the room.” This research says, take the trunk out of the room. Since we cannot predict the context in which we’ll have to perform, we’re better off varying the circumstances in which we prepare. We need to handle life’s pop quizzes, its spontaneous pickup games and jam sessions, and the traditional advice to establish a strict practice routine is no way to do so. On the contrary: Try another room altogether. Another time of day. Take the guitar outside, into the park, into the woods. Change cafés. Switch practice courts. Put on blues instead of classical. Each alteration of the routine further enriches the skills being rehearsed, making them sharper and more accessible for a longer period of time. This kind of experimenting itself reinforces learning, and makes what you know increasingly independent of your surroundings.

Donald Trump repeatedly promised he would hire "the best people." He did not. That is not my opinion; it is President Trump's, which he expresses frequently. Trump has said that his first secretary of state, Rex Tillerson, was "dumb as a rock" and "lazy as hell." His attorney general, Jeff Sessions, was "scared stiff and Missing in Action," "didn't have a clue," and "should be ashamed of himself." Trump described one of his assistants, Omarosa Manigault Newman, as "wacky," "deranged," "vicious, but not smart," a "crazed, crying lowlife," and finally a "dog." After lasting only eleven days as communications director, Anthony Scaramucci "was quickly terminated 'from' a position that he was totally incapable of handling" and was called "very much out of control." An anonymous adviser to the president was called "a drunk/drugged-up loser." Chief strategist Steve Bannon was "sloppy," a "leaker," and "dumped like a dog by almost everyone." His longtime lawyer Michael Cohen was "TERRIBLE," "hostile," "a convicted liar & fraudster," and a "failed lawyer." The president was "Never a big fan!" of his White House counsel Don McGahn and "not even a little bit happy" with Jerome Powell, his selection to head the Federal Reserve, whom he called an "enemy." His third national security advisor, John Bolton, was mocked as a "tough guy [who] got us into Iraq." When the president was irritated with his former chief of staff, John Kelly, the president's press secretary, Stephanie Grisham, declared that Kelly "was totally unequipped to handle the genius of our great president.

He found himself thinking of something Barry Grieg had once said to him about a rhythm guitar player from L.A., a guy named Jory Baker who was always on time, never missed a practice session, or fucked up an audition. Not the kind of guitar player that caught your eye, no showboat like Angus Young or Eddie Van Halen, but competent. Once, Barry had said, Jory Baker had been the driving wheel of a group called Sparx, a group everybody seemed to think that year's Most Likely to Succeed. They had a sound something like early Creedence: hard solid guitar rock and roll. Jory Baker had done most of the writing and all of the vocals. Then a car accident, broken bones, lots of dope in the hospital. He had come out, as the John Prine song says, with a steel plate in his head and a monkey on his back. He progressed from Demerol to heroin. Got busted a couple of times. After a while he was just another street-druggie with fumble fingers, spare-changing down at the Greyhound station and hanging out on the strip. Then, somehow, over a period of eighteen months, he had gotten clean, and stayed clean. A lot of him was gone. He was no longer the driving wheel of any group, Most Likely to Succeed or otherwise, but he was always on time, never missed a practice session, or fucked up an audition. He didn't talk much, but the needle highway on his left arm had disappeared. And Barry Grieg had said: 'He's come out the other side.' That was all. No one can tell what goes on in between the person you were and the person you become. No one can chart that blue and lonely section of hell. There are no maps of the change. You just . . . come out the other side. Or you don't.

On a break from the tour, I went south to Bali, a place the choreographer Toni Basil, whom Eno and I had met during the Bush Of Ghosts sessions, had recommended as being transporting and all about performance. I rented a small motorcycle and headed up into the hills, away from the beach resort. I soon discovered that if one saw offerings of flowers and fruit being brought to a village temple compound in the afternoon, one could be pretty certain that some sort of ritual performance would follow there at night. Sure enough, night after night I would catch dances accompanied by gamelan orchestras and shadow-puppet excerpts from the Hindu Ramayana--epic and sometimes ritual performances that blended religious and theatrical elements. (A gamelan is a small orchestra made up mainly of tuned metallic gongs and xylophone-like instruments--the interplay between the parts is beautiful and intricate.) In these latter events some participants would often fall into a trance, but even in trance there were prescribed procedures. It wasn't all thrashing chaos, as a Westerner might expect, but a deeper kind of dance. As In Japanese theater, the performers often wore masks and extreme makeup; their movements, too, were stylized and "unnatural." It began to sink in that this kind of "presentational" theater has more in common with certain kinds of pop-music performance that traditional Western theater did. I was struck by other peripheral aspects of these performances. The audiences, mostly local villagers of all ages, weren't paying attention half the time. People would wander in and out, go get a snack from a cart or leave to smoke a bidi cigarette, and then return to watch some more. This was more like the behavior of audiences in music clubs than in Western theaters, where they were expected to sit quietly and only leave or converse once the show was over. The Balinese "shows" were completely integrated into people's daily lives, or so it seemed to me. There was no attempt to formally separate the ritual and the show from the audience. Everything seemed to flow into everything else. The food, the music, and the dance were all just another part of daily activity. I remembered a story about John Cage, who, when in Japan, asked someone what their religion was. The reply was that they didn't have a strict religion--they danced. Japanese do, of course, have Buddhist and Shinto rituals for weddings, funerals, and marriages, but a weekly thing like going to church or temple doesn't exist. The "religion" is so integrated into the culture that it appears in daily gestures and routines, unsegregated for ordinary life. I was beginning to see that theatricality wasn't necessarily a bad thing. It was part of life in much of the world, and not necessarily phony either.

In the spring of 2004, the FBI arrested Mohammed Junaid Babar, an al Qaeda agent, as he returned to the U.S. from a terrorist planning meeting in Pakistan (CNN News – August 11, 2004). Facing the potential of a 70 year federal prison sentence, Babar confessed that al Qaeda “was planning a spectacular attack on American soil–a nuclear 9/11 that will occur simultaneously in major metropolitan areas throughout the country.” His testimony was confirmed by another al Qaeda participant at the same Pakistani planning session, Sharif al-Masri (The Day of Islam).

went to the White House and got the President out of bed. Carey and President Harrison were said to be old Senate friends, and no one was present at this session to speak for Johnson County. Quickly convinced of the necessity for immediate action, Harrison ordered a telegram send to General John R. Brooke in Omaha shortly after 11:00 P.M.4 At 11:05 P.M. the president wired Governor Barber that “in compliance with your call for the aid of the United States forces to protect the state of Wyoming against domestic violence,” he had ordered the secretary of war to send troops.5 The president did not have his facts right — the state of Wyoming needed no saving from domestic violence — but Governor Barber made no effort to set the record straight. At 11:37 P.M. General Brooke telegrammed Governor Barber, informing him that the commanding officer at Fort McKinney had been ordered “to prevent violence and preserve peace.”6 This message was received in Buffalo at 12:05 P.M., and within two hours, troops rode out of Fort McKinney under orders from the post’s commanding officer, Colonel J. J. Van Horn.7

Jesus is the Messiah, not your therapist. And the church is your family, not your once-a-week session. There is nothing wrong with a weekly counseling appointment, as long as it is only supplementing, not replacing, your relationships with brothers and sisters in the church.

TEN BEST NEW ORDER SONGS 1.​‘Thieves Like Us’ 2.​‘Leave Me Alone’ 3.​‘Homage’ (unreleased) 4.​‘Too Late’ (John Peel session) 5.​‘Someone Like You’ 6.​‘Ruined in a Day’ (K-Klass Remix) 7.​‘Every Little Counts’ 8.​‘Age of Consent’ 9.​‘Temptation’ 10.​‘Elegia

May 19: At 2:00 p.m., Marilyn arrives at Madison Square Garden for a brief rehearsal. She departs to have her hair styled by Kenneth Battelle at a cost of $150. Then she returns to her New York apartment for a $125 makeup session with Marie Irvine. Finally, her maid, Hazel Washington, helps hook Marilyn into her Jean Louis gown, and she arrives at Madison Square Garden approximately three hours before she is to perform. Introduced to an audience of fifteen thousand as the “late Marilyn Monroe” after she delays her entrance (all part of the carefully rehearsed show), Marilyn performs flawlessly as the last of twenty-three entertainers and is clearly the highlight of the evening. Columnist Dorothy Kilgallen describes Marilyn as “making love to the president of the United States.” Marilyn also attends a party at the home of Arthur Krim, president of United Artists. She is photographed in a group of Kennedy supporters watching Diahann Carroll sing. To her right is Maria Callas and Arthur Miller’s father, Isidore. She is also photographed with both Robert and John Kennedy, as well as presidential advisor Arthur Schlesinger Jr. Schlesinger and Robert Kennedy playfully compete to dance with Marilyn. Contrary to sensationalistic reports, Marilyn spends the rest of the evening in her New York apartment with her friend Ralph Roberts and James Haspiel, one of her devoted fans.

In April 2012, The New York Times published a heart-wrenching essay by Claire Needell Hollander, a middle school English teacher in the New York City public schools. Under the headline “Teach the Books, Touch the Heart,” she began with an anecdote about teaching John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men. As her class read the end together out loud in class, her “toughest boy,” she wrote, “wept a little, and so did I.” A girl in the class edged out of her chair to get a closer look and asked Hollander if she was crying. “I am,” she said, “and the funny thing is I’ve read it many times.” Hollander, a reading enrichment teacher, shaped her lessons around robust literature—her classes met in small groups and talked informally about what they had read. Her students did not “read from the expected perspective,” as she described it. They concluded (not unreasonably) that Holden Caulfield “was a punk, unfairly dismissive of parents who had given him every advantage.” One student read Lady Macbeth’s soliloquies as raps. Another, having been inspired by Of Mice and Men, went on to read The Grapes of Wrath on his own and told Hollander how amazed he was that “all these people hate each other, and they’re all white.” She knew that these classes were enhancing her students’ reading levels, their understanding of the world, their souls. But she had to stop offering them to all but her highest-achieving eighth-graders. Everyone else had to take instruction specifically targeted to boost their standardized test scores. Hollander felt she had no choice. Reading scores on standardized tests in her school had gone up in the years she maintained her reading group, but not consistently enough. “Until recently, given the students’ enthusiasm for the reading groups, I was able to play down that data,” she wrote. “But last year, for the first time since I can remember, our test scores declined in relation to comparable schools in the city. Because I play a leadership role in the English department, I felt increased pressure to bring this year’s scores up. All the teachers are increasing their number of test-preparation sessions and practice tests, so I have done the same, cutting two of my three classic book groups and replacing them with a test preparation tutorial program.” Instead of Steinbeck and Shakespeare, her students read “watered-down news articles or biographies, bastardized novels, memos or brochures.” They studied vocabulary words, drilled on how to write sentences, and practiced taking multiple-choice tests. The overall impact of such instruction, Hollander said, is to “bleed our English classes dry.” So

It was on July 2, 1776 that the Second Continental Congress voted for the legal separation of the Thirteen Colonies from Great Britain. On July 1, 1776, in anticipation of this great day, John Adams wrote to his wife Abigail that Independence Day, would be the most memorable day in the history of America. He wrote “I am apt to believe that it will be celebrated by succeeding generations as the great anniversary festival.” He was right about the day; however he was off regarding the actual signing by two days. Americans now celebrate Independence Day on July 4th, since the resolution of independence was debated on in a closed session of Congress and the Congressional Vote didn’t take place until July 4, 1776. Independence Day has become a National Day to be celebrated with friends enjoying barbecues, picnics and patriotic concerts. So it will be on this day with me. Yesterday I learned that my book “Suppressed I Rise” had been selected for two awards by the Florida Authors & Publishers Association, to be conferred next month at the Hilton Hotel in Disney World. Although July 4th is our nations “Independence Day” it will have additional meaning for me and my friends who have contributed so much of themselves to make these awards a reality. This year the 4th of July will certainly have a special significance to me.

Fortuna wished to make amends. Somehow she had summoned and flushed Myrna minx from a subway tube, from some picket line, from the pungent bed of some Eurasian existentialist, from the hands of some epileptic Negro Buddhist, from the verbose midst of a group therapy session.

Prayer is like a standing counseling session, 24/7, no appointment necessary. Just walk in. And expect to find your Counselor—which is one of the ways Jesus described the Holy Spirit (John 16:7)—always fully understanding your situation and ready to impart timely wisdom.

The Guiding Light is the longest-running serial in broadcast history. Still seen on CBS television, its roots go back almost 60 years, to radio’s pioneering soaps. Though its original characters have been swallowed and eclipsed by time, it still has faint ties to the show that was first simulcast July 20, 1952, and in time replaced its radio counterpart with a daily one-hour TV show. Its creator, Irna Phillips, was often called “the queen of soaps.” She was so influential in the field that she was compared with Frank and Anne Hummert, though the comparison was weak. While the Hummerts employed a huge stable of writers and turned out dozens of serials, Phillips wrote her own—two million words of it each year. Using a large month-by-month work chart, Phillips plotted up to half a dozen serials at once, dictating the action to a secretary. Mentally juggling the fates of scores of characters, she churned out quarter-hour slices of life in sessions filled with high drama, acting the parts and changing her voice for the various speaking roles, while secretaries scribbled the dialogue that flowed from her lips. She gave up teaching early in life to enter radio as an actress at Chicago’s WGN. She was 25 that year, 1930. In 1932 she began to write. She discovered that cliffhanger endings were surefire for bringing those early audiences back to their sets each day, but that slow and skillful character development was what kept the audience for years. She decided that the organ was the ideal musical instrument for those little shows and that the instrument should be played with pomp and power, with all the authority of a religious service in a great European cathedral. The music gave weight to the dialogue, which was usually focused and intense.

This session continued three weeks, and established 100 laws, which were called the Body of Liberties.[41] They had been composed by Mr. Nathaniel Ward, (sometime pastor of the church of Ipswich: he had been a minister in England, and formerly a student and practiser in the course of the common law,) and had been revised and altered by the court, and sent forth into every town to be further considered of, and now again in this court, they were revised, amended, and presented, and so established for three years, by that experience to have them fully amended and established to be perpetual.

But when John began to bring Yoko to recording sessions and consult her about everything he did there, even allowing her to criticize what they were doing, it was too much for the others. They hated it, and it was clear that the arrangement wouldn’t last amicably for long.

halfway through, George Martin had decided he didn’t want Ringo and had brought in a session drummer. The boys were upset and Ringo was devastated, but none of them dared say anything—George had already overstepped the mark when George Martin told them, “Let me know if there’s anything you don’t like,” and George quipped, “Well, for a start I don’t like your tie.” That remark, so typical of the boys’ humor, has been immortalized since, but at the time they were afraid they’d gone too far, that they’d better shut up and get on with the record.

The Judge nodded to the bailiff Don Helzinger, who called the court to order. "Oyez, oyez, oyez, the circuit court for the judicial circuit is now in session, the Honorable Nathan R. Prelate, Judge, Presiding.

Willi and I might take turns reading aloud passages from some of our favorite books (David Kidd’s Peking Story and John Blofeld’s City of Lingering Splendour were always at hand), and at least once during each session Willi’s wife would come down to the Chamber to say hello and recline for a pipe or two.

299 R. v. Inhabitants of Eriswell, 3 Term Rep. 707, 721, 100 Eng. Rep. 815, 823 (K.B. 1790). The case concerned the question of whether it had been error for a panel of magistrates to have received hearsay testimony in a Quarter Sessions proceeding concerning the settlement of a pauper. 300 Discussed in Langbein, “Evidence” 1173–4, 1181–4.

Today I’m trying to focus on my patients (allowing myself to cry only in the ten-minute breaks between sessions, carefully wiping away my running mascara before the next person arrives). In other words, I’m dealing with my pain the way I suspect John has been dealing with his: by covering it up.

Jesus’ appearance before the Sanhedrin and his condemnation to death is seriously undermined by the repeated contradictions and historical and legal improbabilities of Mark’s account, which has been copied in substance by Matthew. Luke and John further muddy the waters. John ignores any trial of Jesus by a Jewish court and Luke omits the night session of the Sanhedrin. However,

1. Are the metrics you use supporting consistent and predictable achievement of your sales plan? Are they predictors of future performance?   2. What data could you use to develop double graph overlays to present the vitality of the sales force?   3. How useful would double graph overlays be for management review sessions?

How Long Will It Take? You can’t blame people for wanting instant results. Time is money, and quickness, especially quick OODA loops, is good. But when it comes to adopting maneuver conflict / Boyd’s principles to your business, there is a lot to be learned and a lot to be done. Consider that: •   According to its principle creator, Taiichi Ohno, it took 28 years (1945-1973) to create and install the Toyota Production System, which is maneuver conflict applied to manufacturing. •   It takes roughly 15 years of experience—and recognition as a leader in one’s technical field—to qualify as a susha (development manager) for a new Toyota vehicle.150 •   Studies of people regarded as the top experts in a number of fields suggest that they practice about four hours a day, virtually every day, for 10 years before they achieve a recognized level of mastery.151 •   It takes a minimum of 8 years beyond a bachelor’s degree to train a surgeon (4 years medical school and 4 or more years of residency.) •   It takes four to six years on the average beyond a bachelor’s degree to complete a Ph.D. •   It takes three years or so to earn a black belt (first degree) in the martial arts and four to six years beyond that to earn third degree, assuming you are in good physical condition to begin with. •   It takes a bare minimum of five years military service to qualify for the Special Forces “Green Beret” (minimum rank of corporal / captain with airborne qualification, then a 1-2 year highly rigorous and selective training program.) •   It takes three years to achieve proficiency as a first level leader in an infantry unit—a squad leader.152 It is no less difficult to learn to fashion an elite, highly competitive company. Yet for some reason, otherwise intelligent people sometimes feel they should be able to attend a three-day seminar and return home experts in maneuver conflict as applied to business. An intensive orientation session may get you started, but successful leaders study their art for years—Patton, Rommel, and Grant were all known for the intensity with which they studied military history and current campaigns. Then-LTC David Hackworth had commanded 10 other units before taking over the 4th Battalion, 39th Infantry in Vietnam in 1969, as he described in Steel My Soldiers’ Hearts. You may also recall the scene in We Were Soldiers where LTC Hal Moore unloaded armfuls of strategy and history books as he was moving into his quarters at Ft. Benning. At that point, he had been in the Army 20 years and had commanded at every level from platoon to battalion.

The glory of the cross is most explicit in the gospel of John when Jesus, speaking of his death, says, “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified” (John 12:23). He continues, revealing that the glorification is also exaltation: “And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself” (12:32). Although such language initially sounds more fitting for the ascension or session, in the next verse Jesus makes it clear that he is referring to being “lifted up” in his death.

Jefferson had written Madison in March 1811.143 It had not been much better for statesmen. “The rancor of party was revived with all its bitterness during the last session of Congress,” his son-in-law John Wayles Eppes wrote Jefferson the same month.144 “United by no fixed principles or objects and destitute of everything like American feeling, so detestable a minority never existed in any country—Their whole political creed is contained in a single word ‘opposition’—They pursue it without regard to principle, to personal reputation or the best interests of their country.

Failures as people: millions of Americans felt that this description fit them to a T. Seeking a solution, any solution, they eagerly forked over their cash to any huckster who promised release, the quicker and more effortlessly the better: therapies like “bioenergetics” (“The Revolutionary Therapy That Uses the Language of the Body to Heal the Problems of the Mind”); Primal Scream (which held that when patients shrieked in a therapist’s office, childhood trauma could be reexperienced, then released; John Lennon and James Earl Jones were fans); or Transcendental Meditation, which promised that deliverance could come if you merely closed your eyes and chanted a mantra (the “TM” organization sold personal mantras, each supposedly “unique,” to hundreds of thousands of devotees). Or “religions” like the Church Universal and Triumphant, or the Reverend Sun Myung Moon’s Unification Church, or “Scientology”—this last one invented by a science fiction writer, reportedly on a bet. Devotees paid cash to be “audited” by practitioners who claimed the power—if, naturally, you paid for enough sessions—to remove “trauma patterns” accreted over the 75 million years that had passed since Xenu, tyrant of the Galactic Confederacy, deposited billions of people on earth next to volcanoes and detonated hydrogen bombs inside those volcanos, thus scattering harming “body thetans” to attach to the souls of the living, which once unlatched allowed practitioners to cross the “bridge to total freedom” and “unlimited creativity.” Another religion, the story had it, promised “perfect knowledge”—though its adherents’ public meeting was held up several hours because none of them knew how to run the movie projector. Gallup reported that six million Americans had tried TM, five million had twisted themselves into yoga poses, and two million had sampled some sort of Oriental religion. And hundreds of thousands of Americans in eleven cities had plunked down $250 for the privilege being screamed at as “assholes.” “est”—Erhard Seminars Training, named after the only-in-America hustler who invented it, Werner Erhard, originally Jack Rosenberg, a former used-car and encyclopedia salesman who had tried and failed to join the Marines (this was not incidental) at the age of seventeen, and experienced a spiritual rebirth one morning while driving across the Golden Gate Bridge (“I realized that I knew nothing. . . . In the next instant—after I realized that I knew nothing—I realized that I knew everything”)—promised “to transform one’s ability to experience living so that the situations one had been trying to change or had been putting up with, clear up just in the process of life itself,” all that in just sixty hours, courtesy of a for-profit corporation whose president had been general manager of the Coca-Cola Bottling Company of California and a former member of the Harvard Business School faculty. A

Having made profession of the glorious gospel of Christ a long time, and preached the same about five years, I was apprehended at a meeting of good people in the country (among whom, had they let me alone, I should have preached that day, but they took me away from amongst them), and had me before a justice; who, after I had offered security for my appearing at the next sessions, yet committed me, because my sureties would not consent to be bound that I should preach no more to the people.

At the sessions after I was indicted for an upholder and maintainer of unlawful assemblies and conventicles, and for not conforming to the national worship of the church of England; and after some conference there with the justices, they taking my plain dealing with them for a confession, as they termed it, of the indictment, did sentence me to a perpetual banishment, because I refused to conform.  So being again delivered up to the jailer’s hands, I was had home to prison, and there have lain now complete twelve years, waiting to see what God would suffer these men to do with me.

SeaWorld decided to use Shamu in a promotional photo session with a model dressed in a bikini. The model, a secretary at SeaWorld, was to take three rides on Shamu. But by the second ride, the whale was showing signs of annoyance. On the third ride, Shamu refused to follow a command and, in the ensuing confusion, the model fell into the water. The whale bit her on the lower torso and limbs and, for several minutes, refused to let her go. The model survived the attack but spent several days in the hospital, where she received more than 100 stitches. She was scarred for life.

Give them an inch, and they take the whole playing field and then change the rules of the game to make sure it is only they who ever get to win. Above all, you cannot beat the Islamists at the long game. When it comes to sheer endurance they will always have the edge. The very definition of moderation is knowing when to stop. What all the Islamists have in common is that they never let up for a second. To quibble with Islam, or, more precisely, with what the Islamists define as Islam, has become the equivalent of advocating that the age of consent be abolished in a full session of the U.S. Senate. Once the Islamists take charge, all arguments must be carefully couched in Islamic terms. Such support as secular movements once enjoyed go up—at least publicly—in smoke. In August 2011, Malaysian activist Norhayati Kaprawi, the director of a documentary about the new stricter women’s dress codes in her country, said some women she interviewed had refused to show their faces in her film. They did so not on religious grounds, but because they feared reprisals. Malaysia is a country living in fear of the radical Islamists, she said. “If you don’t follow the mainstream you will be lynched,” she said, adding that people who hold more progressive or alternative views “don’t dare to speak up in public.”36

Keep It Simple Do not get carried away by the group process. Stick to the single principle. Then you can do good work, stay free from chaos and conflicts, and feel present in all situations. The superficial leader cannot see how things happen, even though the evidence is everywhere. This leader is swept up by drama, sensation, and excitement. All this confusion is blinding. But the leader who returns again and again to awareness-of-process has a deep sense of how things happen. This leader has a simple time of it. The sessions flow smoothly, and when the group ends, the leader is still in good spirits.

Every time I try to diagram some organizational phenomena or strategy, the resulting pretty picture generally fails to create any lasting understanding. Much like movies, diagrams are more meaningful when you are there to witness the “making-of” experience or any other “live” means of presentation. We love to be there at the very moment of conception of an idea, but when we’re not, we’re less likely to be excited by the idea (because it doesn’t feel like our own). There is something to be said for sitting right there and watching the drawing unfold — it can make the spoken narrative clearer. At the very end of an intense diagramming session that has revealed every possible magnificent detail, there is always the moment of excitement and reckoning that warrants, “Wait, wait… let me take a photo of this with my mobile phone.” But when you show it to someone else a week or two later, it no longer makes any sense. Watching something being made is a powerful way to understand a concept; trying to decode just the final result, no matter how simple and visually elegant, demands an explanation of how it came to be.

St. John Chrysostom has the following beautiful simile in one of his homilies: " As a fire which has taken pos session of a forest, cleans it out thoroughly, so the fire of love, wheresoever it falls, takes away and blots out every thing that could injure the divine seed, and purges the earth for the reception of that seed. Where love is, there all evils are taken away." 7 St. Chrysologus says: " You wish to be absolved ? Then love! Charity covereth a multitude of sins. What is worse than the crime of denial? And yet Peter was able to expiate this [crime] solely by love." 8 Among the Schoolmen, Sylvius held a different view, which was, however, rejected by De Lugo and others. 9

I’m not crazy,” I said, crazily, to my court-appointed therapist. He seemed bored with our session. That actually made me want to act crazy, to impress him. Maybe that was his tactic. I thought, maybe I should tell him I’m the only person on Earth who has seen his entire skeleton. Or, I could make something up instead.

1973 was the year when the United Kingdom entered the European Economic Union, the year when Watergate helped us with a name for all future scandals, Carly Simon began the year at number one with ‘You’re So Vain’, John Tavener premiered his Variations on ‘Three Blind Mice’ for orchestra, the year when The Godfather won Best Picture Oscar, when the Bond film was Live and Let Die, when Perry Henzell’s film The Harder They Come, starring Jimmy Cliff, opened, when Sofia Gubaidulina’s Roses for piano and soprano premiered in Moscow, when David Bowie was Aladdin Sane, Lou Reed walked on the wild side and made up a ‘Berlin’, Slade were feeling the noize, Dobie Gray was drifting away, Bruce Springsteen was ‘Blinded by the Light’, Tom Waits was calling ‘Closing Time’, Bob Dylan was ‘Knocking on Heaven’s Door’, Sly and the Family Stone were ‘Fresh’, Queen recorded their first radio session for John Peel, when Marvin Gaye sang ‘What’s Going On’ and Ann Peebles’s ‘I Can’t Stand the Rain’, when Morton Feldman’s Voices and Instruments II for three female voices, flute, two cellos and bass, Alfred Schnittke’s Suite in the Old Style for violin and piano and Iannis Xenakis’s Eridanos for brass and strings premiered, when Ian Carr’s Nucleus released two albums refining their tangy English survey of the current jazz-rock mind of Miles Davis, when Ornette Coleman started recording again after a five-year pause, making a field recording in Morocco with the Master Musicians of Joujouka, when Stevie Wonder reached No. 1 with ‘Superstition’ and ‘You Are the Sunshine of My Life’, when Free, Family and the Byrds played their last show, 10cc played their first, the Everly Brothers split up, Gram Parsons died, and DJ Kool Herc DJed his first block party for his sister’s birthday in the Bronx, New York, where he mixed instrumental sections of two copies of the same record using two turntables.

For the time being, Franklin kept quiet about whether or not he favored independence, and he avoided the taverns where the other delegates spent the evenings debating the topic. He diligently attended sessions and committee meetings, said little, and then went home to dine with his family. Beginning what would become a long and conflicted association with Franklin, the loquacious and ambitious John Adams complained that the older man was treated with reverence even as he was “sitting in silence, a great part of the time fast asleep in his chair.

Paul stayed for a while. He told me that John was bringing Yoko to recording sessions, which he, George and Ringo hated.

Furthermore, in some of my cases (see, for example, Ed and Sheila in chapters 3 and 4) the material recalled during the regression seemed more likely to be accurate than that reported in face-to-face interviews because 1) the information was less self-serving or compatible with positive self-esteem, or, conversely, more disturbing to self-regard, and, in some instances, even humiliating; 2) the material that emerged in the regressions was more believable in the sense that it was consistent with accounts provided by other experiencers – it lacked the gloss and ordering of recollections in conformity with conventional reality that tends to occur with conscious reporting; and 3) although emotional involvement is no guarantee of the accuracy of memory with or without hypnosis, the intensity of affect and expressed bodily feeling that occurs during the regression sessions of abduction experiencers is so powerful that even the most determined skeptic would be hard-pressed to conclude that something quite extraordinary and reality-shattering did not occur. Sheila’s psychiatrist, for example, who had worked with her for seven years, came away from the two Regressions he observed convinced that if not actual alien abductions, something very much like them had occurred.

Below are a few sample language patterns that get straight to the point and have been proven to work: “John, just a couple of quick questions, so I don’t waste your time.” “John, let me just ask you a couple of quick questions, so I can best serve you.” “John, let me ask you just a couple of quick questions, so I can see exactly what your needs are.” Any one of the above examples will set you up for a nonconfrontational intelligence-gathering session that promotes the building of rapport.

The following day, Netanyahu and I sat down for a meeting at the White House. Downplaying the growing tension, I accepted the fiction that the permit announcement had been just a misunderstanding, and our discussions ran well over the allotted time. Because I had another commitment and Netanyahu still had a few items he wanted to cover, I suggested we pause and resume the conversation in an hour, arranging in the meantime for his delegation to regroup in the Roosevelt Room. He said he was happy to wait, and after that second session, we ended the evening on cordial terms, having met for more than two hours total. The next day, however, Rahm stormed into the office, saying there were media reports that I’d deliberately snubbed Netanyahu by keeping him waiting, leading to accusations that I had allowed a case of personal pique to damage the vital U.S.-Israel relationship. That was a rare instance when I outcursed Rahm. Looking back, I sometimes ponder the age-old question of how much difference the particular characteristics of individual leaders make in the sweep of history—whether those of us who rise to power are mere conduits for the deep, relentless currents of the times or whether we’re at least partly the authors of what’s to come. I wonder whether our insecurities and our hopes, our childhood traumas or memories of unexpected kindness carry as much force as any technological shift or socioeconomic trend. I wonder whether a President Hillary Clinton or President John McCain might have elicited more trust from the two sides; whether things might have played out differently if someone other than Netanyahu had occupied the prime minister’s seat or if Abbas had been a younger man, more intent on making his mark than protecting himself from criticism.

Glyn Johns, by contrast, was flummoxed by the group’s self-indulgent, two-day pot-infused trip. “They were just getting high and jamming,”35 he grumbled. His disapproval was not lost on the band. According to Johns, when the session wound down, the two Dennys took him to one side to take him to task. “They said, ‘We’re not happy with you as a producer. You’re not taking any interest in what we are doing.’ I said, ‘When you do something that’s interesting, I’m there. But if you think because you are playing with Paul McCartney that everything you do is a gem of marvelous music, you’re wrong. It isn’t. It’s shite. Frankly it’s a waste of tape and it’s a waste of my energy.’”36 Recording

Individually, each of the Beatles was great to be with,” recalled John Kurlander, a fledgling EMI engineer at the time of the Abbey Road sessions. “They were funny, warm, friendly—really a delight. If there were two of them, that was also great. If there were three, it could be a little dicey, but generally, it was fine. But when all four were together, they closed ranks, and it would be horrible. It didn’t matter how any of them had treated you on his own; when all four of them were in the room, everyone else was treated as an outsider.

To drink this much in one session would kill even an Aberdeen harlot.

The first single was tracked at Media Arts Studio in Hermosa Beach, south of L.A.; the label copy helpfully dates the session—October 9, 1980. The producer is identified as “Screwy Louie.” The A side is a cover of “Under the Boardwalk,” the Drifters’ 1964 R&B ballad. David Hidalgo takes the soaring lead (his first solo vocal on record), effortlessly duplicating the tug of Johnny Moore’s original performance. But the number receives a twist in the band’s hands: in place of the lush string instrumental break on the Bert Berns–produced original, one hears a Tex–Mex button accordion solo. The flip was a rendering of “Volver, Volver,” a bolero penned by Fernando Z. Maldonado that had been an enormous hit for the Mexican ranchera superstar Vicente Fernández in 1976. Returning to his original role as the group’s ballad specialist, Cesar Rosas takes the lead vocal. Here the band offers an old-school East Side spin on the swaying, lushly romantic number, bringing some unidentified friends into the studio to scream and howl in the background, in the manner of the “live” supporting casts on Cannibal and the Headhunters’ “Land of 1000 Dances” or the Premiers’ “Farmer John.

We have had a wretched winter for the farmer,” Jefferson had written Madison in March 1811.143 It had not been much better for statesmen. “The rancor of party was revived with all its bitterness during the last session of Congress,” his son-in-law John Wayles Eppes wrote Jefferson the same month.144 “United by no fixed principles or objects and destitute of everything like American feeling, so detestable a minority never existed in any country—Their whole political creed is contained in a single word ‘opposition’—They pursue it without regard to principle, to personal reputation or the best interests of their country.

From Adobe’s experience, I’d say that a continuous performance management system has three requirements. The first is executive support. The second is clarity on company objectives and how they align with individual priorities—as set out in our “goals and expectations,” which equate to OKRs. The third is an investment in training to equip managers and leaders to be more effective. We’re not shipping people out to courses. We’re steering them to one-hour sessions online, with role-played vignettes: “Do you need to give difficult feedback? Here are the steps.

Civil war is supposed to be the bitterest of wars, and surely family politics are the most vehement and venomous. I can discuss politics coldly and analytically with strangers. That was not possible with my sisters. We ended each session panting and spent with rage. On no point was there any compromise. No quarter was asked or given.

I waited to see if he’d say more, if he’d stop with the jokes. We were both quiet for a bit. Then John began counting. “One Mississippi, two Mississippi, three Mississippi …” He shot me an exasperated look. “How long are we going to sit here saying nothing?” I understood his frustration. In movies, therapist silences have become a cliché, but it’s only in silence that people can truly hear themselves. Talking can keep people in their heads and safely away from their emotions. Being silent is like emptying the trash. When you stop tossing junk into the void—words, words, and more words—something important rises to the surface. And when the silence is a shared experience, it can be a gold mine for thoughts and feelings that the patient didn’t even know existed. It’s no wonder that I spent an entire session with Wendell saying virtually nothing and simply crying. Even great joy is sometimes best expressed through silence, as when a patient comes in after landing a hard-won promotion or getting engaged and can’t find the words to express the magnitude of what she’s feeling. So we sit in silence together, beaming.

You must think I’m the biggest idiot in the galaxy.” “He wouldn’t be the first,” said Alvis.

Much of the way we're taught to view eternal life is as a destination we reach, and until we get there, we're like anxious kids on a long car trip asking, "Are we there yet?" We think we're just biding time until we get there, when the real enjoyment will begin. But what if we're missing out along the way? This book contrasts two ways of thinking about Jesus' gospel. The more common version is thought to involve how people ensure they will go to heaven when they die. It's about how to go from "down here" to "up there." It usually involves affirming certain beliefs or praying a particular prayer that is thought to make a person a "Christian." The other understanding is that the gospel announces the availability of life under God's reign and power now. It's about "up there" coming "down here." By grace. Through Jesus. Transcending death. To all who will. For the sake of the world. The first version tends to produce consumers of Jesus' merit. The second tends to produce disciples of Jesus' Way.

Great Experiment” that Jesus himself invites us to run: “Anyone who chooses to do the will of God will find out whether my teaching comes from God or whether I speak on my own” (John 7:17). Now we begin to understand why the “minimum entrance requirements” question is such a problematic approach to salvation.

and remember, the only bad meditation session is the one you didn’t do!

The Spy Who Loved Me was the epic tantric session of sensual lovemaking that the franchise deserved. The fact that sex is such a key aspect to the plot is hardly surprising given that this adventure was written by Christopher Wood (oo-er), who also wrote the Robin Askwith Confessions films and a wealth of other erotica. Who better to write Bond?

Life will provide a thousand sessions for raising the warrior God calls you to be. Turn your radar on during the day, and intentionally don’t take the path of least resistance.

John Ringelspaugh of Rocky Mount, North Carolina, used this in dealing with his children. It seemed that, as in so many families, mother and dad’s chief form of communication with the children was yelling at them. And, as in so many cases, the children became a little worse rather than better after each such session—and so did the parents. There seemed to be no end in sight for this problem. Mr. Ringelspaugh determined to use some of the principles he was learning in our course to solve this situation. He reported: “We decided to try praise instead of harping on their faults. It wasn’t easy when all we could see were the negative things they were doing; it was really tough to find things to praise. We managed to find something, and within the first day or two some of the really upsetting things they were doing quit happening. Then some of their other faults began to disappear. They began capitalizing on the praise we were giving them. They even began going out of their way to do things right. Neither of us could believe it. Of course, it didn’t last forever, but the norm reached after things leveled off was so much better. It was no longer necessary to react the way we used to. The children were doing far more right things than wrong ones.” All of this was a result of praising the slightest improvement in the children rather than condemning everything they did wrong.

sessions

Hannity is just one member of this crazy cable news cabinet. While he deserved credit for getting longtime Fox News commentator John Bolton hired as national security advisor, Carlson got the credit when Bolton eventually fell out of favor with Trump. The sacking of Jeff Sessions? Jeanine Pirro was in Trump’s ear for that one. The resignation of Kirstjen Nielsen? Lou Dobbs was central in it. Pat Cipollone leading the president’s legal team? Laura Ingraham was instrumental. But

Jesus’ gospel had a tendency to produce disciples.

Intentions repeatedly sustained over the course of many meditation sessions give rise to frequently repeated mental acts, which eventually become habits of the mind.

James Lindsey, age fifty-three, married; occupation—none; address—a rural road out from the remote settlement of Box Hill, almost to Tyler County. His questionnaire said he was a Baptist. He had volunteered nothing during the morning session, and no one seemed to know anything about him. Neither John Wilbanks nor Miles Truitt wanted to waste a challenge, so James Lindsey became the first juror selected for the trial.

Juror number one was a mystery. James Lindsey, age fifty-three, married; occupation—none; address—a rural road out from the remote settlement of Box Hill, almost to Tyler County. His questionnaire said he was a Baptist. He had volunteered nothing during the morning session, and no one seemed to know anything about him.

I stare at the phone. That’s it? No Thank you or even a Goodbye at the end, just . . . done? I had expected that something like this might happen after the first few sessions, but now that I’ve been seeing him for nearly six months, I’m surprised by his sudden departure. In his own way, John seemed to be forming an attachment to me. Or maybe it’s that I’ve been forming an attachment to him. I’ve come to feel real affection for John, to see flashes of humanity behind his obnoxious façade. I think about John and his son Gabe, some boy or grown man who may or may not know his father. I wonder if on some level John wants to leave me with the burden of this mystery, a big fuck-you for not helping him feel better quickly enough. Take that, Sherlock, you idiot. I

Finally John looks back up at me. “Hi, sorry, I had to mute you back there. They were taping. I missed that. What were you saying?” Un-fucking-believable. I’ve been, quite literally, talking to myself. No wonder Margo wants to leave! I should have listened to my gut and had John reschedule an in-person session, but I got sucked in by his urgent plea. “John,” I say, “I really want to help you with this but I think this is too important to talk about on Skype. Let’s schedule a time for you to come in so there aren’t so many distract—” “Oh, no, no, no, no, no,” he interrupts. “This can’t wait. I just had to give you the background first so you can talk to him.” “To . . .” “The idiot therapist! Clearly he’s only hearing one side of the story, and not a very accurate side at that. But you know me. You can vouch for me. You can give this guy some perspective before Margo really goes nuts.” I noodle this scenario around in my head: John wants me to call my own therapist to discuss why my patient isn’t happy with the therapy my therapist is doing with my patient’s wife. Um, no.

This is an important re-reading of this Joshua passage because few preachers highlight the spies as johns, and thus procurers of sex from women. Granted, the two spies were on a mission of espionage, but they also stopped at a brothel, a stop they were never instructed to make.

QUICK REVIEW OF STAGE TWO PRACTICE The instructions for this Stage are simple. You sit down, finish the Preparation for Practice, make the gradual transition to the sensations of the breath at the tip of the nose, and count ten breaths. Hold the intention to follow and sustain attention on the breath sensations at the nose. Very soon, however, you’ll find yourself forgetting the breath and mind-wandering, sometimes for seconds and sometimes for many minutes. Eventually, you’ll abruptly “wake up” to the fact that, even though you intended to watch the breath, you’ve been thinking about something else. Feel happy and pleased about this “aha!” moment of introspective awareness. Then, gently direct attention back to the breath. To engage more fully with the meditation object, practice following the breath. As long as you appreciate the moment of “waking up” to mind-wandering, diligently return attention to the object, and fully engage with it, you’re on the right track. If you sit through the entire session without getting discouraged and if you keep returning to the breath when your mind wanders, consider your meditation a total

A notable experiment in 2007 showed that cognitive flexibility improves after just one thirty-five-minute treadmill session at either 60 percent or 70 percent of maximum heart rate.

Something, everyone who goes through these sessions agrees, has happened to these people, whether or not it is possible to identify the source of what has occurred.

For me and others who have attended the sessions, as well as for the abductees themselves, it is this intensity of recovered emotion that lends inescapable authenticity to the phenomenon.

When the experiences are recalled consciously, or during hypnotic sessions, the abductees go through an emotional reliving of great intensity and power. Otherwise quite controlled individuals may writhe, perspire, and scream with fear and rage, or cry with appropriate sadness, as they remember their abduction experiences. This emotional expression appears altogether authentic to those who are unfamiliar with the abduction phenomenon and witness it for the first time. For myself, being with abductees who are going through these experiences requires every bit of holding energy and caring presence that I can muster. There has not, as yet, come to my attention in any case an alternative explanation for the basic elements of the abduction experiences that these individuals are reporting in such overwhelming and vivid detail.